Phantom Flex4K records fire at 1000 FPS, 4K resolution

An enterprising director and cinematographer have used a Phantom Flex4K camera to capture a burning house fire at 1,000 frames per second in 4K resolution.

The Phantom Flex4K video camera.
(Credit: Vision Research)

The short film, shot by director Brendan Belomo and director of photography Gregory Wilson, used a Phantom Flex4K video camera, priced at around US$140,000. The end result is some of the best footage of fire we've ever seen.

The Phantom Flex4K camera can shoot at up to 4096x2304 resolution using its Super 35mm-sized sensor, and can capture Ultra HD 4096x2160 video at up to 1,000 frames per second. Shooting at that resolution and quality consumes around 16GB of storage a second, so despite the 1TB and 2TB removable storage system that the Flex4K uses, every shot had to be meticulously planned; with an internal buffer of 32GB, each shot could be no longer than 2.2 seconds in length.

This footage from March was the first video to be shot with the Flex4K, which was released as a production model in mid-September. Director Brendan Bellomo has previously worked on visual effects for the Oscar-winning Beasts of the Southern Wild, and DOP Gregory Wilson has used cameras like the Red EPIC, Sony F55, Phantom Flex and Canon 5D Mark II on a variety of shorts and other projects.